My sister married the love of her life on August 29th, 2009

Congratulations!!

more wedding photos here

I can't believe you have been around for an entire year. Even now when I look back at the picture of the day you were born, your tiny baby face looks exactly like YOU.



See?

Today, on your birthday, you are an incredibly easy going kid. You smile all the time and talk to us incessantly...if only we could understand a single word that you are saying I am sure it would be interesting.



You love it when I carry you around in the backpack, and I love it too (except for when you wrap your little fingers in my hair and pull as hard as you can - that gets a bit old) because it gives me a chance to be close to you. When you aren't in the backpack all you want to do is walk around (holding our fingers and breaking our backs) or crawl after your brother.



Your brother is pretty much the most fascinating thing in your life. All you want in the whole world is to be able to run around with the older kids, and if it was possible to make it happen by sheer will, then you would have figured out a way by now.

You are one of the strongest babies ever. You once brought me to my knees when you pulled my hair, and detangling from your grip sometimes takes more than one person to achieve. Hanging suspended from Abbey's fingers, you pulled your legs up into a perfect L. I joke that you will be a Russian Gymnast, but who knows? I often warn people who are holding you to be careful, you enjoy headbutting as a form of communication. It is actually very sweet, except when you aim for my nose.



You are starting to understand that we are separate people and are very sad when you can't see me. It is a hard thing to watch, since in every other aspect of your life you are fearless. You managed to climb to the top of the stairs while I wasn't paying attention, and you just grinned down at me, your legs waving in thin air. You are interested in everything and, at times, it seems like you are especially drawn to anything that you are not supposed to be playing with.



Everywhere we go people talk about how beautiful you are, and they are so right. You are a sweet and beautiful and brilliant little girl, and we are so very very lucky to have you.

Sometimes I think I catch a glimpse of the big kid the Creep is becoming in his little boy face...




And his sister has discovered a new hobby:

This is the box,*
that held the duck,
that was the prize,
for some lucky buck,
that pooped on the potty,
instead his pants,
now his mother's not crazy,
and we all get to dance...

...and stop being obsessed with feces.

* Rhyming inspired by "Duck in the Truck"

Baby Girl has developed a rather unfortunate (and sleep defying) Signature Move.

In the middle of the night, ostensibly to make herself more comfortable*, she will roll over onto her hands and knees, get into a sitting position and then fling herself backwards as hard as she can.

Sometimes she lands on a pillow. Say, one out of five times. Those are the times that she remains peacefully asleep no matter if her head is touching the mattress and the pillow is supporting her lower back and diaper.

My problem, and hers, lies with the other 80% of the landings. Until I developed a supernatural ability to catch her head while still (mostly) asleep, she would fling herself into the wall, the bed frame, the bed railing...oh, and that other hard object in the vicinity. Me.

Imagine with me, if you will, getting punched in the face at 3am. She split my upper lip, almost broke my nose**, clipped my chin on the way to my jugular.

This may have accelerated the house-selling process a bit since there is no where else for her to sleep at the present moment.

Speaking of which, we may have an offer on the house. It is too soon to tell if everything will go through, but not soon enough to start panicking because OH MY GOD THIS MIGHT ACTUALLY HAPPEN. It is terrifying and I am now the person in my group of friends that will just NOT SHUT UP about one particular subject: Can we move away from our little South Minneapolis Community and over to the strange (but vaguely exciting) world of St. Paul.

This will seem silly to those of you not from this area, since for all intents and purposes we are the same city when viewed on a map...but it is common knowledge that St. Paul (or Minneapolis) is just too much of a pain to get to so there isn't a lot of crossover.

So the question that we have been struggling with, and I really encourage feedback here:

"Is the perfect house enough of a reason to leave the (pretty much) perfect community?" (with the given unknown that the new community may be very nice - it seems that way - and the current community has its fair share of issues)

Discuss.


*much like a dog that circles its bed several times before laying down, but much less evolutionarily sound

**I get to say that with no proof whatsoever because it is very difficult to prove that she didn't almost break my nose.