Its Official!

I have officially become that 'Mother'.

Yes this is Grace practicing and Easter Egg Hunt.  Sorry the video isn't the best.  We tried outside but with wind gusts of 40+ mph it became impossible and we moved inside.  We are going to a neighborhood hunt tomorrow and are hosting 2 next week for our playgroup.

Milestones

As our kids grow up we celebrate each and every milestone they reach.  At the same time, we always lament that they are growing up way too fast.  But the worst part is that before they get to the milestone, we are always in a rush for it to happen.   Many times along with the milestone some things get easier and some get harder.   I know the minute that Grace really starts walking more than crawling I won't be as worried about her getting dirty or wanting to crawl on the ground and then try and put her hands in her mouth; Going to the park will be so much more fun once she can walk, but with walking she is going to be into so much more.  Though she is so speedy now with crawling, I am already afraid that I won't be able to keep up with her when she starts walking.    I find myself both encouraging and discouraging walking throughout each day.  I am so torn.  It is so exciting that she is about to walk, yet I am not ready for my baby to be a toddler.

I feel like in some respect we rush the milestones in competition with others.  I know what age both Keith and I walked.   I know what age all the kids in our playgroup walked.  Just like with height and weight - for some reason we are all drawn to advertise these as if they are 'achievements'.  Each child is unique and special.  Each does things in their own way.   As we are on the cusp of a huge milestone, I just need to savor these last few days of my baby before she becomes a toddler.

Lately Grace has been pushing around her cars.  Before when she hit the wall, that would be the end unless we came and helped.  She has now figured out how to overcome this obstacle.

We already bought Grace her first pair of real shoes, but now that she is closer to walking and has outgrown all but 2 pairs of shoes it was time to buy more.  We took advantage of a sale at Stride Rite last week.  I remember wearing my shoes out of the store as a kid so this was Grace's first experience doing this.  I was a Klassy mommy and she went to the store barefooted so the bag just holds the empty box, but still she looks so happy in her new shoes. 

I accidentally took a video instead of pictures.  If I can figure out how to crop it down to one photo I will switch this out, but for now this is all I have.

Purex Crystal Winners!

Random Integer Generator

Here are your random numbers:

12
1
5

Timestamp: 2011-03-21 22:25:37 UTC

Congrats to Patti, Erika, and Debby!

Send me your mailing addresses and I will mail you the coupon.  

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Grace refused to keep the hat on long enough for me to get a good picture.  We made the hat at a St. Paddy's Day party today.

Are you wearing green today!

Purex Crystals Review and Giveaway

As part of being a Purex Insider, I get to sample new Purex products before or as they hit the store shelves. I recently had the opportunity to try the new Purex Crystals fabric softener.  It works in all washing machines.  You add it at the beginning of the wash to the tub and it does its magic.  I love that I can use it with Grace's clothes as well as my workout clothes since it is 92% natural and doesn't have oil which can interfere with performance of these fabrics.  That being said I really wish they made it in a fragrance free version, since I'd love to make sure that my daughter's clothes are super soft, but I don't like her to have all of the additional scent.  It is nice knowing though that if one of her clothes gets accidentally washed with our clothes that it will not harm it.

My laundry helper - She likes to help fold(well unfold)

I have tried this for the last couple of weeks and I have to say that I really like it.  Our towels are much fluffier and the scent really does last.   I have been using it for all of our laundry except for Grace's.  I particularly love it on our sheets, towels and t-shirts.  It works great on the rest, but I have just gotten so used to washing all of our clothes with fragrance free detergents that it seems weird for my jeans to smell so fresh, but the scent isn't a bad thing at all.   There are currently 3 fragrances - Fresh Spring Waters, Tropical Splash and my favorite Lavender Blossom.

If you would like to buy the product there is a $1 off coupon on Purex's Facebook page, but Purex has given me 3 coupons for a free bottle of Purex Crystals to giveaway.  To enter leave a comment with the scent of Purex Crystals you would like to try.

For bonus entries leave a comment for each of the following:

1.  If you follow my blog.

2.  If you follow me on Twitter.  

3.  If you liked Purex on Facebook.  

4.  If you tweet this giveaway - provide link

5.  If you blog this giveaway - provide link

The giveaway ends Sunday March 20th 12:59 pm.  I will announce the 3 winners on Monday, March 21.

1 year = 12 months = 365 day = 8760 hours = 15 minutes

Yes I know that is creative math, but that is how long the video montage that I put together for Grace's first year is.  I had a great time putting this together - thanks to my Macbook.  It was so much fun revisiting all of our experiences.  I can't deny that there might have been a few tears when I was making it.  She was so tiny and I still feel bad about her little conehead, which thankfully went away very quickly(not sure why the thumbnail shows that snippet of the video). It is really long though so I don't expect anyone but family to watch all of it.   I wanted to have one place with all of the major events of Grace's first year and found it hard to leave anything out.


Untitled from Kristi Peshke on Vimeo.

ONE!!!

Grace is 1.  It is so hard to believe that this past year has flown by so fast.   Last year this time, Keith and I were frantically trying to figure out how to care for this tiny little 5 day old baby.  Of course, the pain from the c-section, the exhaustion from getting up during the night and befuddled feelings of what to do to make her happy have long since gone and we've settled into a great routine.   Actually, amazingly the way I remember it, things were pretty good at the beginning.  I don't know if I expected worse or if we are conditioned to forget the bad.  Of course, we had a few days there at the beginning that we really struggled at what to do to console Grace, but thanks to help from our families we figured it out.   And now a year later, we have a giggling girl that loves to clap and show us how big she is just to get our reaction.  She is quite the character now with her personality starting to shine through.    I know this year is going to be just as amazing with the changes that she is going to go through as she learns to walk, run, talk, learn, make friends etc.

Grace is now 30.3 inches and 22lbs 11 oz.  She had a huge growth spurt over the last 3 months.  I began to wonder a couple of weeks ago when suddenly she seemed to have outgrown a lot of her clothes.  Good thing that spring is around the corner since her winter clothes now look like capri's and 3/4 sleeved shirts.

MILESTONES/EVENTS -

• She has been crawling and cruising, but she is starting to toddled a bit.  A few steps here and there, but not quite ready to take off.  The Dr. said that it is just getting over the fear now.  
• Grace is babbling up a storm.  No real words yet, but they will be here soon.  I am hoping that 'mama' is first.  She babbles mamamamama a lot. 
• Completed flights 14 and 15.  The ski trip to Colorado was a blast.  Grace definitely got to see here fair share of snow this first year for a southern baby between the snow in Michigan at Christmas, the ski trip, and all of the snow that we got here in Dallas.  
• More trips to the zoo, aquarium,  etc.  We are exploring Dallas and look forward to doing more this year. 

Both sets of grandparents came in for the birthday week.  They were a huge help getting everything set up for the party as well as helping us with a few tasks around the house as well.  We first celebrated on Grace's actual birthday.  It was her first taste of cake and she loved it.  No qualms what so ever - she just tore in to the cake like she eats it everyday.  Saturday during the party she was a bit more reserved with it, but she was having so much fun watching everyone else that she was almost too busy to eat her cake.

Grace loved her little red wagon from Mimi and Grandpa!

Grace is really enjoying her new chair from Nanie and Papa!  She sat it in this morning to watch a little Mickey Mouse Clubhouse.

We are so happy that so many people were able to celebrate the day with us.  Grace is one very blessed little girl.

Here are a few pictures of the party decor.  The theme was 'Hot Pink and Orange with Giraffes and Monkeys - which is the theme in her nursery as well..  I made all of the decorations myself.  Next year I think that I am going to buy it pre-made or I need to start when she turns 18 months old so that I am ready.  I did have fun learning to make a lot of this.  I hope to re-use many things in her room like the pom-poms over the crib and the wreath on her door.