My Zoe: A Year in Pictures

On today, her 1st birthday,

a year in pictures of my sweet lovely girl.

October

November

December

January

Febuary

March

April

May

June

July

August

September

October

A great day!

This proud girl not only asked her teacher to take her to the bathroom when she had to pee, but then came home and poo'd for the first time in her little potty!

And there was much rejoicing and happy dancing!!!

In Zoe news, the appointment with the dermatologist went well. He confirmed our pediatrician's diagnosis of POD (Perioral Dermatitis, aka the constant rash around her mouth) which is a condition that primarily effects young women and is only seen in children in less than .1% of the population (this child should play lotto 'cause she hits all the numbers!).

It is not caused by any allergies, environmental factors or facial cleansings...it just is. The good news is that it is not chronic and it will go away (slowly) with the cream prescribed.

When I pouted a little about the fact that tomorrow is her birthday (!!) and we're having a big party for her on Sunday, he offered some fast acting steroid cream that should help to relieve her symptoms in time to look her best for the many photos we intend to take. It is already working...

Picture Overload

Photos for Aunt Mimi who is jonesing for her little girls. Just a few recent ones that were on my camera....

Athena tasting the merchandise while apple picking
with YiaYia and Poppop.

Zoe in a candy store in Boulder.

Learning to walk has it's down falls (she was fine).

Bubbles and boots

Mmm. Popsicles.

The naked singing cowgirl (edited)

Zoe pensive on the swings.

Athena, the stylist

Toys toys toys

Last night Chris and I broke our own rule and bought toys for the girls. We were at Target and they were so cute and being so good, we relented. It did not go well.

Zoe was immediately thrilled with an old fashioned tin Jack-in-the-box (so cute) but our princess, Athena could not chose. What we thought would be a great reward, turned into a tantrum inducing ordeal ("No honey, we're not getting the $29.99 Little Einsteins magna doodle where you can trace Van Gogh paintings, pick something else!") After going down each aisle, we ended up with some Backyardigans piece of junk (and she never watches the Backyardigans?) with little pieces that will get lost thus rendering the toy useless in the course of a couple of hours. I wonder if I can steal it and exchange it for the more practical "PlayDoh Tote" that I failed to convince her was a good idea?

We set this "No Toys" rule because, toys just seem to accumulate (gifts, hand-me-downs, etc), we have enough toys and typically a new toy yields about three seconds of interest before it is tossed aside. Plus all the recent toy recalls makes me fear all things plastic and made in China (which is Everything). Zoe's first birthday is fast approaching, and I hope we can stay firm with this policy. Books are lovely, keepsakes and clothing are fun and to illustrate what we mean when we say no toys needed:

Zoe's current list of favorite things, or what she has played with most recently:
A shoebox
Her shoes
The remote control
Mommy's computer mouse
Mommy's cellphone
A spiral notebook
A spoon and an empty yogurt cup
Her sister's school's product fundraising catalog
Her sister's sippy cups
A bucket
Mommy's empty Starbuck's cup and a straw (at the grocery store)
A diaper wipe (clean)

Here's what Zoe really needs for her first birthday:
A better pediatrician who can properly diagnose her constant facial rash.
An appointment with an Allergist so we can end this guessing game.
A new forward facing car seat (thanks Mom!)
Protective body suit to keep her sister from hurting her
Straighter front teeth
A photo session for her one year portraits (just to keep it fair)
The motor control to actually hold your own popsicle so that you don't have to rely on others to feed it to you
Her Mimi to come home and lavish attention on her
Lots and lots of kisses and love from her favorite toys of all, her family.

Go Big Blue!

While her Daddy was watching a great game between UK and LSU, Athena cheered the Wildcats on (with a little prompting). Zoe just wanted to get her hands on a popsicle.

Photo and video editing at www.OneTrueMedia.com

We have first steps!

Zoe took her first steps into her Daddy's arms tonight! He was holding a remote control and she really, really wanted to get her little baby hands on it. She stood on her own and then took two independent steps from the ottoman towards the coveted item that her Daddy had. Of course I was NOT Johnny-on-the-spot with the camera and instead was applauding and cheering so much it scared her a little bit.

Besides this little tiny tremendous milestone, we had a sweet Mommy, Daddy and Zoe evening as Athena is spending the night with YiaYia. Last I heard, Athena was wearing fairy wings and jumping on YiaYia's couch singing Barney songs. It is so quiet here without our two-year old bundle of energy.


Having one child is almost like not having any at all. Especially when that child is the ever-chill and easy-going, sweet baby Zoe. We went to our favorite diner, had a peaceful meal and returned home and put Zoe to bed with no protest. It's like a vacation.

Toddler Still Life

Walking into our bedroom and finding a stuffed owl carefully tucked under a baby blanket on top of the pile of comforter at the foot of our unmade bed prompted me to write about a very disconcerting phenomena that we call "toddler still life".

Living with a toddler is somewhat like living with aliens. You find the oddest accumulation of things in unexpected spaces on a daily basis.

Often I will walk into the kitchen and find soup cans taken out of the pantry and neatly stacked in the middle of the kitchen floor. Or a sippy cup on top of a glass candle holder on top of a Dora toy on the bookshelf. I wonder about the thought process behind these random towers.

Is this a talent or some kind of a compulsion?

It is also very common to open a cabinet door and find a purple bunny sleeping in the colander or random toys filling kitty boots left in the hallway.

Objects are taken out of context in a surprising way and seem to tell a story, but not one that makes any sense. It is so odd to suddenly come upon these creations when you're not expecting them. Perhaps we should attempt to sell them as objects d'art on eBay?

Life interupted

Sometimes everything stops for a week or so when you are needed. Priorities are shifted to make room for more urgent matters. And normal life is put on hold while you work through the problem at hand.

While I've been preoccupied, the girls have learned to do more things for themselves.

Athena learned how to make her own lunches.

Zoe became quite good at feeding herself.

Through necessity, Athena developed the ability to gather food.

The attempt at cooking did not go very well at all.
Basically, they were just left to their own devices.

Happily all is right with the world once again (or at least it soon will be) and we will go back to our previously scheduled programming of first steps, new discoveries and, of course, potty training...

Blog lapse

The blog was temporarily forgotten last week as life got in the way. All is well now and back on track. I promise to update tomorrow...

"Bah Bye Mountains!"

When we were driving away from Boulder, Athena looked back and said "Bah Bye mountains, I luh you.! See you when me get back!" So, even though we'll probably never live in Boulder (as much as I want to) we will visit. It is one of my favorite places. We had such a great visit. We loved spending time with Aunt Katie and Grandaddio and Grandma Andree, Theresa and meeting Robert and his amazing family. The trip was too short.

Traveling back was pretty rough. Our flight from Dallas to LGA was delayed on the tarmac at both airports so we spent a full 8 hours on the plane. Athena was amazing. She cuddled right up, plugged in to her Little Einsteins DVDs, sipped her sippy cup and was fine. Zoe took two naps and had a couple of meltdowns, which is to be expected for an active little one who could not escape our arms. Luckily we had a full bank of grandmas sitting behind us who engaged her and were not annoyed by her fussing.

I think Chris and I were both impressed by the travel-ability of our little family. If only we could afford both time and expense we could do this more often.

My wonderful husband bearing the burden
of two little ones fast asleep on him.